No Acceptable Substitute
by Audrey V
Summary: Emily Prentiss is in exile, with a new identity. As Amelia, she haunts a bar in a tourist hotel, seducing strangers who remind her of the friends she's lost, but every meaningless encounter leaves her more desperate to find the release she craves.


This is a response to this prompt from the Criminal Minds Kink Meme V:

"During the seven months that Emily's gone, she goes to bars and picks up strangers to combat the overwhelming loneliness of being away from the team. Whenever she sleeps with these strangers - men and women - she can't help pretending that they're her teammates and imagining what they would be like in bed."

Author's Note:

Feedback of any and all sorts is much appreciated! I hadn't intended to become a repeat fic writer, but the response to my first one was so positive that I had to try it again. I'm finding I like putting characters in extreme situations while still keeping them relatively IC; while I don't think Emily Prentiss would ever pick up a stranger in a bar under normal circumstances, I think being assaulted, then exiled, isolated and forced to leave her identity behind could push her over that edge, and this story is an exploration of that (with a lot of hot sex thrown in.)

TW: there is a brief mention of non-consensual choking in a consensual sexual encounter.

When she was Emily instead of Amelia, she would have stifled a laugh when the team's resident genius started quoting statistics about hotel bars and serial murder. Emily knew that Amelia's recreational activities weren't the safest, but she took precautions, and she considered herself a pretty good judge of character. Plus, it wasn't like any of her conquests would ever learn her real name.

Amelia liked the tourist hotels, so an unwelcome French accent wouldn't break her out of the fantasy if her bedmate of the moment opened his (or her) mouth.

The first time, she melted into the arms of a soldier, a strong, dark man with an easy laugh and formidable arms. She let him take charge. He eyed the scars on her stomach for a moment after her shirt came off, but the question didn't come until afterward.

"That's some scar," he said. She knew she was supposed to respond with an explanation of the jagged purple mark, but she didn't. Eventually he understood that he'd have to make up his own story later, and he dropped it, but as she kissed him goodbye at the door she smiled and whispered, "An international terrorist stabbed me with a wooden stake."

He laughed. "You some kind of secret agent, baby?" he asked as she shut the door. She wasn't sure if he believed her, but she figured it would give him an interesting tale to tell his compatriots back at the base.

Another time she found herself trading barbs with an older Italian man with a face like a puppy dog. Emily was pretty sure he was married, but details like that didn't matter to Amelia. Amelia just gestured for another round of whiskey and enjoyed the attention, even though she knew this one would never take it past innuendo. No matter how graphically he described the sensuality of his cooking, she knew he loved his wife.

There was the gangly MIT grad student who couldn't believe that she'd chosen him over one of his more suave traveling companions. He'd been one of the most attentive lovers she'd had, if perhaps a bit fumbling. He took direction well, and his voice was close enough that she could close her eyes and pretend it was familiar spindly fingers teasing her body to new heights.

The next one didn't look much like the man she wanted him to be, but he was sad and serious and that was enough. She managed to tease his control away from him as they writhed in the sheets, and he transformed into a man possessed, grabbing at her hips as he slammed into her. It hurt, but it was what she wanted.

"Yes, harder," Amelia urged. He complied, moving his hands to press her shoulders into the mattress of the hotel bed. His fingers dug into her skin and she moaned. This was how she imagined it would be if she were in bed with the real man instead of a surrogate. You can only bottle up tension for so long until it explodes, she thought, as her bedmate left bite marks on her collarbone.

She came, hard, as he growled filthy names into her ear, and then as her body was still shuddering, he moved his hands to her throat and pressed down, cutting off her air supply for a few moments before he found his own release. Afterward, when she was alone and touching herself, she'd set aside that part, because the man in her mind would never have gone so far. Instead, she'd fantasize about the words, how he'd make her beg him to fuck her, and how he'd look directly into her eyes as she came.

After that near-miss, she found an office girl from Cleveland and seduced her. The girl introduced herself as Olivia, but Amelia snooped and found a passport that just said Ann.

Amelia almost never let them stay over, preferring to show them the door and spend the rest of her waking moments pleasuring herself, superimposing other faces onto the ones that had minutes before been hovering over her, kissing her, trailing tongues along every curve of her body. Part of the release she needed could only come when she was alone, without a breathing reminder of what she'd lost.

Amelia made rules but Emily made exceptions to them. Olivia- Ann- was a tornado of sweet awkwardness, and she reminded Emily of home, particularly when she pulled out her iPad and laptop and started using them simultaneously to check her web stats. They'd barely come through the door, and while most of Amelia's recent bedmates would have been stripping her down, Olivia was tapping away at her electronics. It was a welcome change. A half hour later, Amelia was thrilled to find that the curvy redhead was just as focused on her body as she'd been intent on the screens.

"Olivia is a pen name," her lover confessed as the sweat evaporated from their now-still bodies. She was holding Amelia, who was enjoying the feel of her companion's ample breasts on her naked back. One hand snaked firmly around her waist and it was Emily who was reminded of what it felt like to be safe. "I'm a writer. Sort of. I design experiences. Alternative reality gaming. Have you heard of it?"

"My life is an alternate reality," Emily replied before Amelia ended the conversation with a heated kiss that signaled round two.

The next morning, Emily's heart swelled with comfort and warmth when she saw a bright purple blouse, polka-dotted skirt, frilly blue underwear and bright green stilettos strewn across her floor, but Olivia had a plane to catch and after a last gentle, sensual kiss, she took her chaos and disappeared down the hall.

The blonde was the hardest to replicate. She stalked the hotel bars for weeks looking for a suitable substitute. That one was too thin, all bony hips and narrow wrists; she couldn't dominate Amelia the way she needed to be dominated. That one was too loud and Amelia suspected that she'd narrate the evening's activities like a Super Bowl announcer. Mostly they were all just too bland, too boring to measure up.

She found one that might have worked, but half an hour into their pleasant conversation about nothing, the reasonable substitute's face lit up.

"My boyfriend," the oblivious young woman had explained, waving to a man across the room, although Amelia couldn't have cared less since her chances of salvation tonight had just plummeted to near zero.

The happy couple left the very irritated brunette sitting at the bar by herself. Amelia- or Emily, because at this point she was almost drunk enough to try being herself- was on her third gimlet when she felt someone settle on the stool next to her. She could feel eyes on her but she was in no mood to engage with another not-quite-right stranger tonight.

"Buy you a drink?"

Amelia studied the newcomer for a moment before replying, "I already have a drink."

"Then you can buy me a drink." Bold, and sassy. Right up Amelia's alley. Perhaps this evening wasn't quite ruined yet. She gestured for the bartender, who a moment later was bringing a whiskey to her new companion.

"Cheers," the woman said before downing the drink without a shudder. As the alcohol hit her, she smiled suggestively at Amelia.

"What's your name?"

"Amelia."

"And why are you sitting alone in this terrible bar tonight, Amelia?"

"I suppose I was waiting for the right person to come along."

"I see."

Amelia noticed that the woman did not volunteer her name, but it didn't really matter. Amelia gave beautiful girls a lot of leeway and this one was definitely beautiful. Her eyes were blue, the right shade of blue even, pale blue eyes that were now, Amelia realized, sizing her up. The other woman's rosy lips turned up at the corners just a bit as she surveyed Amelia body. Amelia, for her part, did not flinch under the scrutiny. With any luck, she thought, where the eye goes, the hand and lip will follow.

Full glasses appeared before them. Amelia took a swig, startled at the acidic taste.

"Grapefruit juice," her companion replied, to a question that had not been asked. She ran her fingers through her long blonde hair, pulling it up into a messy ponytail. Amelia felt the heat rising to her cheeks as she pictured her hands in that hair, caressing and pulling. She was so distracted by her thoughts she'd missed the last thing the blonde had said.

"I'm sorry, what did-"

"I said, I don't fuck drunk girls."

"Then it's a good thing," Amelia replied, shifting on her barstool so that her body invaded her soon-to-be-conquest's personal space, "I'm not a girl." She felt the woman shiver almost imperceptibly before her walls went up again.

"A boy in girl's clothing then?" she taunted.

Amelia stood and tossed a few bills on the bar. "You could find out if you like," she purred as she turned to leave.

The elevator doors opened and the two of them stepped in. To a casual observer, they might have been a mismatched pair of sisters, or just old friends, but the air in between them was electric and thick with the possibility of sex.

"What's your name?"

Amelia felt the woman's breath on her neck. The elevator had stopped, someone had pressed the stop button, it might have been her but she couldn't say. She was close enough to smell the faintest hint of lilies on the blonde's neck, and she thought she caught a hint of ginger in her hair. She looked down into those blue eyes, realizing she had the other woman pinned against the wall of the elevator, their bodies just barely touching.

"I told you already. It's Amelia," she replied, the warmth of her breath eliciting another shiver from the blonde. "And yours?"

"You have to guess."

"I know! It's Rumplestiltskin!"

"Nope. You have three guesses left because that one doesn't count."

"Okay. Is it Erica?" Amelia moved a bit closer, her breasts brushing against her companion, who pretended not to notice and shook her head. "Then is it Hannah?"

"Do I look like a Hannah?"

"Of course not. Can I give up?"

"You have one more try." Another devilish grin.

"Alright," Amelia replied, taking one step to press her body into the blonde's. Her fingers found their way into that long, silky hair. "Is it Jennifer?"

"Do I look like a Jennifer?"

"Yes, actually."

"You're a better guesser than you let on," the blonde replied, snaking her hand around Amelia's waist to punch the elevator button to resume their ascent. She stood on her tip toes so she and Amelia were eye-to-eye, and she gently brushed her lips against Amelia's.

"Hello Amelia. I'm Jennifer." Another barely-there kiss as the elevator shuddered to a stop and the doors sprang open.

Then they were in the hallway and finally Amelia was swiping the key card to access her room. A moment later they were inside and Jennifer's hands were quickly divesting her of her jacket and sweater. They'd barely even kissed but the tension was so powerful that Amelia found herself pulling at buttons and zippers frantically. Soon after, Jennifers skirt joined a pile with Amelia's slacks and both of their blouses.

Jennifer pulled Amelia's bra from her shoulders, leaving both of them naked. Amelia's entire body ached to lay next to this woman, but it seemed a sin to rush. She traced small circles on Jennifer's abdomen with her nails and planted a series of kisses along her collarbone. Tonight she could be one person, she thought, as the disconnect between her real life and this ruse melted away. Maybe tonight she could even be Emily, she thought, daring to hope that this one might be what she'd been seeking.

Jennifer had stilled, her hands gently touching the unblemished skin on either side of the scar. Emily- and she was now thoroughly Emily-fought the urge to flee. Damn it, Prentiss, she thought. You've been shot at and beaten and had a goddamn stake shoved through your stomach, yet you flinch at a simple, gentle touch?

"Does it hurt?"

"Sometimes."

"Does it bother you that I'm touching you like this?" The pads of her fingertips had migrated to the middle of the angry pink scar tissue. "Are you uncomfortable?"

"Yes," Emily replied, and the hands stilled.

"Do you want me to stop?"

"... No."

Their eyes met and Jennifer nodded. She gently walked Emily backwards towards the bed, one hand resting against the scar. Moments later, Jennifer was slipping into the bed next to her, whispering in her ear.

"We don't have to."

Emily shook her head. "No, I would... please. Please," she said softly but firmly, unable to articulate anything more complicated. She felt like she'd been turned inside out. Every cell in her body was vibrating and her senses were screaming at her to run as Jennifer began to kiss the bare skin of her shoulder.

Emily's fear response began to ebb as her sense of touch took over. The kisses were lighting fires under her skin. Everywhere Jennifer touched turned into a hot spot, and as Jennifer's lips continued their descent, Emily could feel the heat cascading down her frame and pooling between her legs.

Jennifer gently circled one of Emily's nipples with her tongue. The dark peak hardened under her ministrations and a low growl escaped from Emily's throat. Jennifer could feel the tension building within her dark-haired lover as she grazed her tongue over the curve of her ribs, but suddenly Emily stiffened.

"What do you feel when I do this?" Jennifer asked as she slowly and gently pressed her lips to the jagged scar.

"It's scar tissue, I don't fee-"

"You know what I meant." She laid another kiss on the scar as she moved lower, following it down the right side of Emily's body.

"I feel... alone."

"And?"

"And... I don't know."

Jennifer sat back and stared at her. "We both know that's a cop out."

Emily drew herself up, tangling her legs with Jennifers in the process. She laced her fingers through the blonde's hair, drawing her face close. "Maybe it is. But are you here to psychoanalyze me?"

"Would you like me to?"

"I need you to fuck me."

"Not make love to you?"

Emily cocked a perfectly arched eyebrow and let her lips travel down Jennifer's throat before replying. "Make love to me in the morning. Fuck me now."

Jennifer flipped them over so she was above Emily. She straddled the dark-haired woman's waist, holding her to the mattress as she bit Emily's shoulder, just hard enough to hurt like hell without breaking the skin. Emily yelped and tried to pull away, but Jennifer's lips were already soothing the wound, her tongue massaging away the last of the pain.

Jennifer marked a trail down Emily's chest, biting and sucking her skin and watching the strawberry marks rise in her wake. This time she kept to the left side, away from the scars. As she reached the gentle curve of Emily's stomach with her mouth, Jennifer's hand began to slide up Emily's leg, caressing her inner thigh. Emily gasped and tangled her fingers in that blonde hair as she felt fingertips brushing over the juncture of her core.

Jennifer slipped one finger into Emily's wet folds, caressing around her clitoris but avoiding the direct contact she knew her partner craved. She let her hand explore lower, teasing around her opening. She traced maddeningly slow figure eights, letting Emily's pleasure build until she couldn't control the pleading sounds coming from her throat.

"What do you want, Amelia?" Jennifer purred, dropped her head further to suck on the sensitive skin on Emily's hip. The pleading escalated as Jennifer drew her tongue back and forth along the spot.

"Please... please Jennifer," Emily gasped, writhing under her lover's hands, repeating her appeal until the other woman took pity on her and used her tongue to draw a path from the indentation of her hip to the curve of her center.

Just when Emily thought she couldn't take any more, Jennifer slid her tongue down, crashing it into Emily's aching clit. She lashed at the nub as she thrust two of her fingers deep inside Emily, whose keening pleas morphed into throaty growls. They fell into a rhythm like old lovers. Emily's hips bucked as Jennifer slid into her, again and again.

Emily felt herself on the edge. She could feel her release rising from the tips of her toes, concentrating all of the pressure. It built up under Jennifer's mouth as the blonde kissed and sucked and pushed into her, again and again. It was what she couldn't find with any of the others, they weren't close enough to the real thing, but this time she would have the blissful quiet of a mind-numbing orgasm, and those spare moments after in which she could almost forget.

She teetered there, the waves on the brink of crashing over her but still maddeningly out of reach. She grabbed at Jennifer, tugging her up.

"I need... to see... your face," she gasped between ragged, frustrated breaths. Jennifer crawled up into her arms, using her hip to put more force behind each thrust, pinning Emily to the bed as she sobbed and thrashed. Emily buried her fingers in Jennifer's hair, holding the blonde's head in place as she stared into those blue blue eyes. Jennifer could feel Emily's body contracting around her hand, the tremors reverberating down her limbs.

"You're safe, Emily," she said, as she stared into dark eyes that flooded with tears. With a shudder and scream, Emily's world went dark around the edges and a succession of images cascaded through her brain. Flashes of her surrogates, awkward Olivia from Cleveland with the red hair, spindly fingers of the wrong genius, the look the dark soldier gave her when he saw her scar, the hollow laughter of the half-dozen inadequate blondes who never even made it back to the bedroom, the control freak pressing down on her neck and things starting to go dark and not caring if she lived or died, because she was dead already and everything else was just prolonging the suffering.

Another firework exploded in her mind and she saw herself sparring with Morgan, an easy smile lighting up his face moments after she took him to the floor. He fucked her against a locker, roughly, but she knew his hands were on the small of her back, a barrier between the cold metal and her flesh. There was Reid, awkwardly quoting statistics but she felt him reaching out for something more human as he buried his face between her legs. She saw Garcia illuminated by her screens, surrounded by them; when they came together, it was sweet, old-fashioned making love in a room lit only by candles. A flash of Rossi, tangling his hands in her hair as she went down on him in his car. Then there was Hotch in his office, ever the stoic, but when he laid her on the desk and thrust into her, she saw a hundred different emotions on his face, and when he got an awkward cramp in the middle of things, they laughed about it.

As Jennifer continued to move inside her, more than six months of pent-up frustration exploded from Emily. The blonde kept plunging into her as wave after wave broke. Emily's vision blurred again, or maybe the world did, but when she could see clearly again, she was still staring into Jennifer's eyes. As the quaking subsided, Jennifer stopped her thrusting but left her fingers inside of her lover as Emily slumped, exhausted, against her. They were still and quiet for a moment before Emily spoke.

"Thank you, J.J."

"For what?" the blonde asked as she began to slowly move inside of Emily once again. This time, there was none of the desperation of their last coupling, and she found a near-agonizingly slow pace.

"For saying the right thing at the right time," Emily replied, closing her eyes and letting the sensations wash over her as J.J. kissed her languidly and deeply. That time when she came, she was just one person, in a room with just one other person, and the eyes that were locked on hers were the ones she'd been looking for.


End file.
